The thing about resilience

The thing about resilience is you never feel that way.

Resilient.

It feels like scraping by

Surviving.

It feels like touching your feet to the floor will take every ounce of strength

And setting your hands to work another day towards another undefined goal  

might break you.

And the thought itself, of saying another goodbye in the hopes of “moving forward” ,

breaks you already.

Who thought I was strong enough for this?

Who thought I could handle another new start 

In another city?

Or that feeling of an old place that should feel serene but doesn’t today.

“God will never give you more than you can handle” they say 

But he has .

Again and again

And we’re still here.

He’s here.

I drove slow through well-lit curvy village roads 

And I stopped correctly at the stop signs

And I muttered to myself words that should lift a spirit

until i couldn’t see through the salty water hanging on my eyelashes.

and stinging open wounds on my face-

scabs and scars from a year that almost killed me. 

One that broke my heart 

And humbled me

And shattered my ideals of what I thought i knew about the world

And myself 

And breathing .

I stalled and pulled over and I screamed at my Dad.

Why did you think i could handle this? 

But that’s the thing about resilience.

You never feel that way.

You wake up and stir another bowl of oatmeal and you show the hell up for the souls gracious enough to share a calendar invite with you.

Feeling utterly drained, with not a single thing to offer

You show up. You eat that oatmeal and you wait for your windshield to defrost and you show up.

That’s the thing about resilience.

It’s not glamorous. No one thanks you for making those choices. 

“Child, I see you.”

Tonight I stand in the shower and I allow the tears to come.

I let the heaviness settle- of comparison, the people who have it much worse than I…

But I let my tears come too.  

And mix with shampoo and a face regimen I pray will heal those wounds that have settled as scars .

And I hold my hand to my heaving chest whisper “thank you” to a pounding heart.

for showing up when my body was shivering.

Scalding water doesn’t stop this kind of shivering but I’ll stand there anyway and I’ll thank my resilient heart

And the Spirit that sustains me 

And breathes into me when I can’t find my own breath. 

That breath does’t feel brave. 

But that breath-

that’s the thing about resilience.